Saudi Arabia will host Formula E for a seventh time this week, but it'll be the first E-Prix weekend to be held anywhere other than Riyadh as it hits a shortened version of the Jeddah Corniche Formula 1 track.
The change has come about through the previous Diriyah street track, rightly lauded for its challenge and complexity, being consumed by rapid development in the area.
In fact, the original plan had been for Diriyah to be replaced in 2023 but space and legislative granting was found to ensure two further editions of the races could take place that year and again last season.
The building work on various infrastructure projects around the historic Diriyah site was unmissable, and even the residual dust was a talking point as it took several sessions to clean the newly laid track.
"We miss Riyadh, that's for sure. Diriyah is a Giga project," Formula E's Saudi promoter Carlo Boutagy, the founder of the CBX company, explains.
"They have NEOM, the Red Sea global, Qiddiya, so there is a lot of investment and work going on as part of Vision 2030."
That plan, announced in early 2016, is the Saudi government's initiative to increase diversification economically, socially, and culturally.
Diriyah is one of these investment projects as well. A $70billion one, to be precise.
"We managed to stay and stay and stay until they needed the [Diriyah track] area where we were to finish their development project," adds Boutagy.
"So, we had to move out of that site. And although we found other locations in Riyadh, unfortunately they couldn't host the 15,000-20,000 capacity that we wanted to have. Jeddah was the best option, and we love it here."
The Jeddah Corniche area is vastly different from the Diriyah district of Riyadh and already there are signs that the move will be positive in terms of the crowd that it attracts; Boutagy says tickets had sold out by last Thursday (February 6).
"We sold out one day, both general admission and grandstand. And the other day, I think we only have general admission remaining, and now we're checking with health and safety to see if we could up that," he says.
The Race can reveal that Jeddah will host Formula E races until at least 2026, but an extension for a 2027 event too is likely at this stage.
Another chapter could then be opened amid the sheer cliffs of the Tuwaiq Mountains at the Speed Park track in Qiddiya. Designed by Hermann Tilke and ex-F1 driver Alex Wurz, the track features what is billed as the world's first elevated racetrack corner, The Blade, which stands 70 metres high.
Night races, which the Saudi races with CBX and Formula E first staged in 2021, would be a spectacle at the new track - but first, Jeddah will continue that tradition with a light show all of its own this week.
The task there compared to Diriyah is inherently much easier as the permanent Jeddah facility makes operations and the overall build much slicker.
"It's much easier but there are still some challenges because it's a new venue for us too," says Boutagy.
"We're different from Formula 1. We have different requirements, and we've had a few challenges. But it's generally been very smooth and everybody's relaxed.
"It's looking good, the weather's fantastic and you know, in Jeddah they say: 'Jeddah Gheir'. That translates as 'Jeddah is Different'."
The initial deal for Formula E to race in Saudi Arabia was for a decade but such has been the collaboration so far that an extension to that feels inevitable.
"Saudi changed a lot from the seven years we've been here working on this project, and we've seen it change a lot," notes Boutagy.
"Seven years ago, we were the jewel, the only big event here. Now, we're one of at least 300 events that happen in the Kingdom, if not more, and sometimes on the same weekend. But we were the event that opened the door to the Kingdom for tourism.
"I'm talking tennis, snooker, boxing, and then you have the Red Sea Film Festival, which is a cultural event under the ministry of culture, so there is a great choice of different events and activities too.
"We have delivered three events recently, with E1 [electric boat racing] being two weeks ago, there was the Alula cycling tour as well.
"Every weekend there is something, and during the week, they have other events. The Kingdom won the Winter Olympics, the Asian Games, the Islamic Games and then they won the World Cup in 2034 and they also have the big [Riyadh World] Expo 2030 too.
"These are massive global events that happen every two or four years. So, the Kingdom delivers and now it is normal for these celebrations of sport and culture to be here, which is fantastic.”
Of course, big business is woven into the sport as well. The Public Investment Fund (PIF) has created a multi-year partnership with the series, called Electric 360, with Formula E, Extreme E and E1 tied-in to "support the growth of electric motorsports and their role in advancing the future of electric mobility".
PIF is one of the top sovereign wealth funds in the world and is, Formula E states, number one in the Middle East for sustainability among the top 100 sovereign wealth funds globally.
The partnership is also promoting educational opportunities tied to the engineering of electric motorsports, as well as community, social programmes and environmental stewardship.
The early pioneering days of the Diriyah E-Prix, first held in November 2018 as the first Gen2 race in unseasonably poor weather conditions, feels longer than seven years ago. Perhaps that's just a legacy of how quickly the Kingdom has become entrenched in not only motorsport but also large-scale events which now appear to be drawing a genuine appetite for live sport and interest in electric motor racing.
